The Contest Read online

  She nodded.

  “Last night after I left the hotel, I was thinking about Ang and how much work she has. I realized that I was expecting her to do the jobs of two or three people. It hit me that I should just hire someone to help her. The problem is this: I need someone who can work a short-term assignment, who gets along with everyone in the building, and who already has some experience. I mean, who could I find on such short notice? It had to be someone who didn’t mind the hours or the work, and who had a positive attitude even when things were tough. Then I thought about what Ang had said about wishing she could keep you around. I know you have two weeks of school left, but I was wondering how you would feel about working here, for me, with Ang, for the summer?”

  Silence and a dead stare, probably not a good combo. He watched as she picked up her coffee and brought the cup to her lips. Her hand was shaking.

  “Please say something,” he pleaded.

  “Umm.”

  “No, really. You can tell me I’m crazy. You can nod yes. You can tell me you think I’m an ass and that you’d never want to work for someone like me. But please, just say something.”

  “You want me to work for you?” she asked with bated breath.

  “Yes,” his lips curled into a smile. “So I know you’re planning on going back to Titans for the summer. I did some research and see you’re making $9.75 an hour. I know the plan is to save money so I figured I could make it worth it for you. Ang has already said you could live with her for free for the summer; I spoke to her this morning. You wouldn’t need a car because we would take care of your transportation. I would pay you $1000 a week before taxes. You’d be expected to work long hours, maybe even weekends. I can be difficult to work for, but seeing how you did these last few days, I think you can handle me. You’d be working under Ang as a second assistant. You’d need to go on part of the tour with us, and all your travel arrangements and expenses would be included. I know you don’t have a passport so we would need to expedite that. The tour starts in LA. We have concerts in London, Paris, Spain, and Germany before we come back to the U.S. for New York, Pittsburg, and a few others before school starts. Just tell me when you need to go back and that will be your end date. I assume you’ll do an outstanding job and then I’ll write you a glowing letter of recommendation for your first job out of college. So, what do you say?”

  Still silence. “Madi?”

  “You want me to work for you?”

  He had to laugh. “I think I covered that. What do you think?”

  “I don’t understand.” Her eyes darkened in disbelief.

  “Which part?”

  “The part where you said you wanted me to work for you.”

  He sighed and stared at her. She wasn’t making this easy. His fingers glided through his hair and he ran his hand over his mouth. “Look, I know it’s sudden, but everyone on my team really likes you. I think you’d fit in well. You would be doing us a big favor. Ang could use your help. I could use your help.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay as in yes?”

  “Okay as in, I’m starting to understand. Are you sure? You really want to see me again?” Her eyebrows shot up in wonder as she spoke.

  Jake started to worry. Was he making the right decision? Did she think this was more than business? He admitted that he thought she was a nice girl, but he did not want her to think he was asking her because he wanted to date her. He did not want to date her. He said it again in his head almost as if he was trying to convince himself of the fact. No, he needed her to be clear this was purely a working relationship.

  “Look Madison, I know that we joked around a lot the last few days, and I do tend to try to keep the mood light at work, but what I am asking of you is purely for business purposes. If you don’t think you can handle it, then that’s fine. I can probably find someone in the next two to three hours.” His face grew shrewd and stern.

  The responding look on her face was confusing to him. He didn’t mean to come across like a dick, but when it came to business, he didn’t mess around. It was one of the reasons he made as much money as he did. He couldn’t read her and he wondered if he pushed it too far. He pulled himself in and tried to remember she was young and hadn’t been around the way he had. He smiled, “So come on, what do you say? It’ll be fun, I promise.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay what?”

  “Okay I’ll do it, I think. I mean, I need to talk to my parents. I need a second to think. Wow, it’s an amazing offer. I think it would be a great opportunity for me. It’s just, I’ve never done anything like this before.” Madi looked down at her plate, picked up her fork, twirled it in her fingers and placed it back down.

  “I understand. It’s a lot to take in. You’d need to sign a contract. We can iron out the starting and ending dates, and you’ll also be expected to sign a confidentiality agreement. I can’t have you telling people stories about me or where I live,” he said with a smile.

  “I would never… Jake, you can trust me. I would sign whatever you needed me to.”

  “Fantastic! I think you’ll like working with me, with us.”

  “There’s no doubt in my mind. I just, you know… I’m used to having chicken salad. I really need to think this over.”

  Huh? What did she say about chicken? “Listen, I know it’s a lot to consider. As long as I know you are open to it, then I can wait a few days for you to talk it over with your family. Just make sure you talk to Kendra, too. Something tells me I can count on her to convince you.” He tried to give her an encouraging smile. He hoped he hadn’t pushed her too hard. He really wanted her to say yes. He really, really wanted it, more than he cared to admit to himself.

  She smiled back at him. He could see the girl he knew the last couple of days coming back to the surface. She had slipped away from him for a few moments, but she seemed to be back.

  “How should I contact you?”

  “I’ll give you my cell,” he said. “Here’s the contract and confidentiality notice for you to read over. I’ll write my number at the top.” He scribbled away.

  He watched her look at it briefly. She picked up her phone and started typing the number in to her contacts. He felt his phone buzz in his pocket.

  “Excuse me for a moment.” He grabbed his phone and looked at the text he had just received. It was an area code he didn’t recognize, strange… He read the text twice.

  Madi: Hi potential boss ;)

  He glanced up to see her holding her phone and giggling. His heart skipped a beat or two and he couldn’t help himself. He suddenly felt the need to convince her to come back to him.

  “Listen Mads, I know this is a lot, but I really think we get along well together. I promise to be nice and make you laugh daily. Just please, really think hard about this and then say yes. I don’t want you to say no to me. I don’t take no very well.”

  “I don’t think I could say no to you.”

  With that his heart rate tripled. He wanted her back in LA, soon, with him.

  Chapter 11

  Madi

  Madi sat deep in thought as people loaded onto the plane. She pinched her own arm and jumped slightly, looking down again at the contract she held in her hand. It was still there. It was real. It had really happened. Jake Morgan had just asked her to spend the summer with him. She thought about that again. No, he had asked her to work for him. There was a huge difference. But still, she would be seeing him every day. She would get to hear him sing and go on part of his tour. How could she go overseas? How could she even consider this? She couldn’t. She would have to say no.

  Jake had thrown her for a moment when he seemed angry with her. He had made it clear this was purely business. Could she stand to be near him and know he would never have feelings for her? Could she stand to watch women like Christine Paul hang all over him? Could she stand to watch him date other women and know it would never be her?

  What was wrong with her? She needed to stop thinking with he
r heart and think with her head. He was, first and foremost, a businessman. She knew she was a hard worker and she really did like the work she had done with Ang. Which to choose: a job at Titans dealing with crabby people all day, all summer long, or working for Jake Morgan and his traveling band? What would a job for Jake Morgan look like on her résumé? It could truly open doors for her. The summer would probably fly by and she’d get to go to places she had never been for free. Kendra was going to die. She couldn’t wait to tell her. She wanted to call her the minute Jake had dropped her off at the airport, but she couldn’t resist seeing her face in person when she told her.

  Jake was so sweet the rest of their time together. After he was briefly stern with her, his attitude changed. He seemed to be almost pleading with her to work for him. On the drive from the restaurant to the airport, he listed off all of the good qualities Madi had said about him herself in the restaurant. He’d told her that if she really believed he was all the things she had said he was, then she’d say yes. How could she say no? Even if there would never be anything romantic between them, she really did like him as a person. He made her laugh and was wickedly charming and clever. Had he called her Mads? She was sure she’d heard it. No man had ever called her Mads before. Kendra penned the name. Not even her father had said that. She was always “Pumpkin” to her dad.

  What would her parents say? She was technically an adult and she could say that she was going whether they liked it or not, but she knew she never would. She wanted them to be proud of her. She wanted to make her dad proud more than anything. He had worked so hard his whole life, and more than anything, she wanted to show him that she could make something out of herself the way he did. What would he think about all this? Did she want to be away from them for so long?

  Madi tapped her fingers on her armrest then touched Jake’s number at the top of the confidentiality agreement. What about her twenty-first birthday? She and Kendra had already planned the whole thing out months ago. Would Kendra be upset? Maybe Kendra would tell her to stay, too? Maybe Kendra would see that she was starting to have feelings for Jake. Maybe she’d know that being around him for a couple of months would just prolong Madi’s inevitable heartbreak. Could she be away from Kendra all summer? These last two days felt like weeks.

  She looked out the window and listened to the clatter of people chatting as they found their seats. She felt her phone buzz with a text. She glanced toward the door and saw people still clambering on the plane. She had time to answer it, if she wanted to. She was certain before she even looked at it that it was Kendra. She couldn’t say anything until she landed. Just make small talk, she thought. She looked down at her phone. It was from Jake. A text from Jake? Be still her heart.

  Jake: Do you miss me?

  Oh my God! Did she miss him? What was that supposed to mean? Did he want her to miss him? Madi had to stop herself from overanalyzing the text. She took a deep breath and wrote:

  Madi: You’ve given me a lot to think about.

  Hmmm, maybe she should play his game too. She quickly added:

  Madi: You are always on my mind.

  That ought to do it. Let’s see what he says to that. A few minutes of waiting felt like a lifetime until her phone buzzed again.

  Jake: It warms the cockles of my heart to hear you’re thinking about me. Just make sure you think about how sad you will make me and what it will do to my already low self-confidence if you say no. Did I mention how much I want you to say yes?

  Oh, he’s a wordy texter. Keep him talking, she thought.

  Madi: If, and I do mean IF I say yes to you, we may need to have a session where we dive into my growing concern over your childlike need to never be told no. By the way, I have yet to see anything resembling low self-confidence with you. If there is any issue, it may be that you seem to have too much confidence.

  Madi giggled to herself. He texted back almost immediately.

  Jake: Hmm, I see your brief time away from me has given you too much time to consider what other faults I may have. Please note that my ability to not take no for an answer has only to do with you.

  Gasp. Why is he doing this to me, she thought. Does he not understand he is flirting? The hell with it… she typed,

  Madi: Your sudden need to flirt with me to get me to say yes to you only increases my concern for your inner child.

  He quickly responded:

  Jake: I’m not used to waiting. If you are at all concerned for me, my inner child, and my current stress levels you will tell me you’ll be back here pronto. I don’t like the idea of having to look for another Madi.

  Madi was growing more confident and more ballsy with every text.

  Madi: You will find there is no other Madi.

  She giggled to herself imagining the cocky response she was about to receive. She waited - nothing. She waited and nothing… “Come on, Jake.” Then finally:

  Jake: I knew that the moment I laid eyes on you.

  What did he just say? She knew in her heart of hearts she had to get back to him as soon as possible, before he changed his mind and forgot all about her. She wanted to tell him that the minute she laid eyes on him she felt something. Something she had never felt before. She started to write back, erased it, wrote again and erased it. What could she say back to him? Was he being silly or serious? As she sat there trying to think, he texted again.

  Jake: GTG, duty calls. Have a safe flight. TTYL

  Her heart dropped. He had to go? It was probably for the best. She was overanalyzing anyway.

  Madi: K. Don’t work too hard. Be careful.

  Nothing came back. Madi glanced at her phone several times before she had to turn it off, but he was gone. Madi wondered to herself what his “duty” consisted of for the day. If she worked for him, she would know every move he made. She might get to go with him to interviews and rehearsals. She daydreamed and analyzed the rest of the flight. She considered that maybe she hadn’t had enough time to see his faults. She was sure that after a week or more she could dive into his personality and find a reason not to like him. She could feel that she was slowly convincing herself to say yes to him when the pilot asked the attendants to prepare for landing. In a few minutes, she’d see Kendra. Kendra would know what to do. She always had the answer. Madi just hoped Kendra’s answer was also yes. She would need to convince her. She had to.

  Madi walked through security and saw Kendra waving her hand and jumping up and down with a bunch of balloons in her hands. Madi didn’t realize how much she had missed her until that moment. Kendra dove at her and they both fell to the ground. People were staring.

  “Madi, Mads, Madi! I missed the shit out of you! Let me look at you! Oh my God, you’re different! You look like an LA chick now. Let me sniff you. Is that him I smell? Did he rub himself all over you before you left?”

  “Ken!” Madi laughed as she got up off the floor. “Not here. I have so much to tell you. Let’s get in the car.”

  After Kendra and Madi piled into Kendra’s Lexus, Kendra said, “Okay, spill.”

  Madi swatted a balloon out of her face that had made its way from the back seat to the front. “Hold on. I... I can’t see you.” Madi climbed over the seat and secured the balloons under her purse before latching her seat belt.

  “Okay, you see me. I can tell something happened. Tell me right fucking now before I die!” Kendra said as she pounded her palm on the steering wheel.

  Madi took a deep breath. “At breakfast today… Jake, well… Jake offered me a job.”

  The Lexus came to a screeching halt. Cars around them laid on their horns.

  “He offered you a job? Did he ask you to be his sex slave?” Kendra looked freaked out, but amused.

  “No! Are you kidding me? He asked me to be his second assistant over the summer. I get to go on tour with him for free. He’s paying me big bucks. He was serious and it was a legitimate offer. I think it might be good for me? I don’t know. What do you think?” Madi nervously waited and hoped for the answ
er she wanted to hear.

  Kendra’s face went slack. Her mouth hung slightly open and she stared wide-eyed at Madi before her lips slowly curled upward. “What do I think? I think hell yes, that’s what I think! I think HELL YES!”

  Madi knew right then why, even though they did not share blood, Kendra was and always would be her sister.

  Jake

  Late morning light spilled into his room. He yawned and attempted to focus on the clock. 11:24 a.m. His leg felt like lead. He looked down to see Murphy sleeping on top of him. “I have a king sized bed and yet you insist on sleeping on top of me?”